I will never survive this disease, but I’m thriving
JUST like Sarah Harding, Emma Fisher was in her 30s when she was diagnosed with breast cancer.
“I was completely shocked,” she says. “I was healthy, active and lived an action-packed life.
“But one day, my dog jumped up on me and stood in between my breasts. It hurt and I noticed a little lump.
“I thought it was nothing, but it started to grow.”
Emma, now 39, says: “After a biopsy and an ultrasound scan, I was diagnosed with primary breast cancer. I tried to stay as positive as possible.”
Then 35, she had six rounds of chemotherapy and 23 of radiotherapy, finishing her treatment in March 2017.
STRONG
However, six months after finishing her treatment, Emma, who works in digital marketing, began to feel a subtle pain in her chest.
And in February 2018, her worst fears were confirmed when she was told her cancer had returned and spread to her lymph nodes and bones.
Emma, of Sheffield, says: “I went on a snowboarding holiday in California and when I got home, I found out the cancer had returned.
“Secondary cancer is not curable so even if it goes away it will always come back.
“I will have to live with it for the rest of my life – which is expected to be between three and five years.”
But despite her diagnosis, Emma is determined to stay strong and positive.
She says: “I’m never going to survive this. Instead, I like to think I’m thriving with it.
“I still moan about work and my boyfriend and go on holidays and drink too much prosecco on a night out.
“Last year we went to Copenhagen, Berlin, Glastonbury, Amsterdam, the South of France and eight or nine beer festivals.
“There’s lots of things I want to do ‘one day’ – but that has to be ‘one day’ soon.”